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High Road Workplace

Federal Minimum Wage

One of the biggest reasons the economy remains sluggish is that real wages have not increased although many businesses enjoy record profits. Productivity gains have been divorced from wages, harming businesses as well as American workers. Consumer spending is the engine that moves our economy and with little to no wage growth, demand remains anemic, overall economic growth suffers and the recovery stalls. The Raise the Wage Act, introduced earlier this year, addresses the largest problem business leaders see with today’s economy: weak demand.

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As business owners and executives, we support gradually raising the federal minimum wage to at least $12 by 2020. It’s good for business, customers and our economy. Today’s outdated minimum wage has far less buying power than it had in the 1960s. Stuck since 2009 at $7.25 an hour – just $15,080 a year – the minimum wage impoverishes working families and weakens the consumer spending at the heart of our economy.

Raising the minimum wage makes good business sense. Workers are also customers. Minimum wage increases boost sales at local businesses as workers buy goods and services they could not afford before. And nothing drives job creation more than consumer demand. Businesses also see cost savings from lower employee turnover and benefit from increased productivity, product quality and customer satisfaction. The most rigorous studies of the impact of actual minimum wage increases show they do not cause job loss. Raising the minimum wage will keep more dollars circulating in our local economy and reduce the growing strain on our social safety net caused by inadequate wages.

We support gradually raising the federal minimum wage to at least $12 an hour by 2020, and then adjusting it yearly to increase at the same rate as the median hourly wage. This will restore the lost value of the minimum wage, assure the wage floor does not erode again, and make future increases more predictable.

Respectfully,

Latest Developments

Latest Developments:

The federal minimum wage has been stuck at $7.25 an hour since 2009. Today’s minimum wage has a third less buying power than the minimum wage of 1968, adjusted for the cost of living. Senators Patty Murray and Bernie Sanders and Representatives Bobby Scott and Keith Ellison introduced the Raise the Wage Act in April 2017. The Raise the Wage Act would increase the minimum wage to $15 by 2024 and then index the federal minimum wage so that it increases at the same rate as the median hourly wage.

We cannot build a sustainable economy on a falling wage floor. Today’s $7.25 minimum wage has less buying power than it had in 1950 and a third less than in 1968, adjusted for inflation. Employees are also consumers and businesses need customers who can afford their products. That’s what drives job creation.

Businesses also see cost savings from lower employee turnover and benefit from increased productivity, product quality and customer satisfaction.